Episode 16- Butterflies and Hunting for Heaven

Fluidvibe — Tue, 25 Sep 2018 19:26:21 +0000

Episode 16 finishes off our time in Manuel Antonio, Costa Rica. Before heading out of the Si Como No Hotel, we checked out their butterfly garden and got underway. The day was rainy and filled with Palm Plantations. We headed south to Dominical and stopped quickly through town and looked at the waves and beach area. We kept moving and stopped through Uvita and decided to keep going to Golfito. In Golfito, we grabbed some gas and reprovisioned for our final couple of hours to La Pavones. The drive from Golfito was not nearly as bad as we thought, extremely gravelly but grated pretty well. We rolled into Pavones and found us a place at La Ponderosa, a sweet little surfer haven with awesome grounds and beach access. We finished the night off with the best pizza we have had since Europe. Authentic thin crust pizza only 5 minutes down the road, could not be beat. We are so happy to find this little slice of heaven.

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Episode 15- Manuel Antonio National Park- Monkey Mafia

Fluidvibe — Sun, 26 Aug 2018 17:00:59 +0000

In this episode, we make a day of the Manuel Antonio National Park. This park is Costa Rica’s smallest but second most visited in the country. We get hit up at 6:30am on the street for a parking fee, of which the hotel receptionist told us that we didn’t have to pay. Then wandered a mile to the entrance of the park to begin our day. The park entrance was filled with guides all vying for your money and attention. We opted to forgo the guides and entered the park.

We were checked for food and beverages, and had to toss our pringles as they make too much noise for the monkey mafia and are a prime target for a shakedown. Within a hundred feet, we started off with a 4-5 foot snake and the animal adventure didn’t stop after that. From monkeys, bats, crabs, woodpeckers, iguanas, to eventually seeing a sloth and the white face monkey mafia later in the day.

The park was pretty busy even at 8am, which was something we weren’t used to coming from the nicoya peninsula. We ended up spending five hours in the park, with the highlight being the monkeys near the beach and the sloth on our way out of the park. The beaches were beautiful, but with so much walking we weren’t really in the mood to get sandy. The day ended back at the pool with a torrential rain coming in before dinner.

Dinner was at this restaurant with a huge airplane in the lobby, it was cool ambiance, but the service and food was horrible. We went home to prepare for our next days departure south to Dominical and Uvita, but some things ended up changing our minds. Join us next time to see what happens!!

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Episode 14- Jaco, Quepos, and Manuel Antonio

Fluidvibe — Sun, 26 Aug 2018 17:00:11 +0000

Episode 14 takes us south from the Marriot Herradura through Jaco, one of Costa Rica’s busiest beach towns. Jaco is only a few hours from San Jose and draws a large amount of tourist all times of the year. We stopped shortly to fly the drone and watch some surfers, before getting back on the road to Quepos and Manuel Antonio.

Quepos was our next stop as it is the gateway to Manuel Antonio National Park. We grabbed a quick bit to eat, finally splurging on a Subway, while grabbing some more provisions at the store and money at the bank. Quepos was a little on the sketchy side, but a nice stop before heading up the hill to Manuel Antonio.

We were a bit early for checkin at our Hotel Si Como No, so we did a drive by down by the national park to check out parking and the beach. This section of Costa Rica was filled with 50-100 parking agents trying to charge everyone for parking, even on the street. We arrived back at our hotel to the amazing view of the Pacific Ocean and relaxed a little bit before getting our room sorted.

The afternoon was filled with a relaxing sesh by the pool and dinner at the hotel. We realized very quickly that this area of Costa Rica was not our style and promptly changed our nights to 2, in preparation of getting further south. Next episode, we hit the park and see the monkey mafia.

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Episode 13- Puntarenas Ferry Fun

Fluidvibe — Wed, 16 May 2018 18:47:05 +0000

In this episode, we head out from Santa Teresa and take the backroads to Montezuma. We had some wild roads with some muddy, slippery action. We find a cool surf break, but no time to give it a try. We find Montezuma and checked out the cool vibe of this little hippy town on the southern coast of the Nicoya Peninsula. After a fill up with some gas, we made our way to Paquera to catch the ferry across the gulf of Nicoya to main land Costa Rica. We were on our way to Manuel Antonio and decided to stop short of Jaco, in Herradura at the Marriott for one quick night before making our way south.

Makanas Beach Bungalows

Cameras:
DJI- Spark
Canon 70D
Go Pro Hero 5- With Gimbal

Music:
Drake Stafford- Casets ( Intro)
Eme Hache- Beach House
Jurek Raben- Dream On
Marc Burt- Poles Apart
Eme Hache- Right There

Thanks For Feelin The Vibe!!

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Episode 12- Chill Day Santa Teresa

Fluidvibe — Wed, 16 May 2018 18:44:07 +0000

In this episode, I start the day with the early morning drone flight and some sand fleas (Noseums) and make it back to the room to find our newly acquired dog “peppa” chillin on the porch. Listened to the Howler monkeys go crazy over our room and breakfast spot. Then off to the beach for a relaxing day in the sand. The kids surfed and bodyboarded. We finished the day with some sunset timelapse and an amazing dinner at a local hamburger place. The evening was chill and we prepared for the following days journey to the mainland of Costa Rica across the gulf of Nicoya.

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Episode 10- Samara’s Samara

Fluidvibe — Mon, 30 Apr 2018 15:13:52 +0000

Episode 10-Samara’s Samara

This Episode has us exploring the town of Samara, Costa Rica. We catch some beach time and get some drone footage of the town. With paved roads, restaurants, hotels, banks, and a supermarket, Samara was one of the most up to date towns we had been in since Tamarindo. We had a pizza at the local Hostel and strolled through town checking out the local wares and t-shirt shops. We made our way back to Playa Carillo and enjoyed one of the most picturesque beaches in all of Costa Rica. We had a little time enjoying the coconuts and beer, evacuating before the afternoon rains came in. Then spent the better part of the evening watching the sky change to every color imaginable. Also lightning from a distance is pretty rad as well.

Samara, Costa Rica
Playa Carillo, Costa Rica

Music:
Drake Stafford- Casets (Intro)
Evan Schaeffer- Mantra
Drake Stafford- Bee Hive
Eme Hache- Help Me
Drake Stafford- Dolos

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Episode 11- Another Bumpy Ride, Islita to Santa Teresa!

Fluidvibe — Mon, 30 Apr 2018 15:07:36 +0000

Costa Rica Episode 11

It begins with some early morning drone flights through Hotel Punta Islita and the surrounding area. We slow play our departure and get under way to Playa Coyote. Unfortunately, we couldn’t take the direct roads to our next location of MalPais because of 3 non bridged rivers ( Rio Ario, Rio Negro,. So we took a scenic drive to the other side of the peninsula to get on the main highway. Once arriving on Highway 21, we were excited to finally be on normal roads for the first time in a week. But, that didn’t last long, maybe 10 minutes of nice highway and we were back to bumpy potholes for the next 3 hours. Arrived in MalPais and enjoyed a late lunch at The Bakery- This place was awesome, great breads, paninis, smoothies and more. Definitely a place to stop for breakfast or lunch when in this area of Costa Rica. We made it another few miles down the horrible pothole filled main road to our accommodations for the next few days. The place was called Makanas Beach Bungalows and was only $50 per night. The room was clean and the beach was 200 meters from the front door. We strolled on the beach , videoed, and droned the area during the amazing sunset. Finished off the night using the kitchen at the hotel and enjoying some cup o noodles to save a few bucks.

www.makanascr.com – Makanas Beach Bungalows @2.3 miles north of Playa Carmen Crossroads

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Episode 9- Punta Islita & Red Macaws

Fluidvibe — Fri, 30 Mar 2018 17:18:15 +0000

Episode 9 of our Costa Rican Road trip begins early with a flat tire, caused from the crazy drive the night before. Costa Rican roads are extremely bad in certain areas and driving at night changes things all together. Arriving after dark to Punta Islita, I noticed the tire starting to deflate while taking the bags out and decided I would fix the issue before anyone woke up. On may way out to the car, I heard a number of large birds squawking in the tree in the parking lot. It was bright and early and the birds started to increase in number.

I began the tire change and had some trouble with the stripped lock nut on the spare. The staff arrived and noticed my difficulty and helped me call Alamo to come over and assist later in the day. In the meantime, I ran back to the room to grab Samara. She is my bird lover and I wanted to show her the macaws that were going wild by this time in the almond tree by the car. She was so excited to see the birds, as was I. I had never seen these macaws in the wild and their colors and size were amazing. We stood watching the birds for an hour. They were close enough to touch and was way better than any zoo or nature park, we had ever been too.

The management of the hotel said it was not normal to see them and that this was the first time in over a year that they arrived. We took it as a sign and spent the good part of the morning watching and filming them.

We had lunch at the hotel with some basic burgers and nachos, while the Alamo representative arrived to fix the tire. Before lunch was finished they had me back on track and ready to roll, at no charge.

The rest of the day we explored this hillside resort by drone and foot. The only drawback to the hotel was that the main pool was designated adults only and we had to make our way down to the beach to the family area to enjoy some swim action. Eventually, we got over the pool situation and loved being by the beach, with the palms, grass, and wide open space.

Punta Islita is a very remote area about 10 miles south of Samara and is now accessible by car even during the rainy season. We wouldn’t find this out til the next day when we made the quick 20 minute drive north to explore the town for Samara. We learned this lesson the hard way and made a 2 hour detour to get here through Nicoya the night before, as we were worried about hitting another dead end river crossing adding even more time to our road trip south.

The evening ended with some relaxing beach time followed by dinner at the hotel. The prices were reasonable and since there is no other option in town it was our only choice for food besides more cup o noodles. On to bed and prepared for the next day exploring Samara’s Samara.

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7 Best Non Essential Items for a Costa Rican Trip

Fluidvibe — Fri, 23 Mar 2018 20:15:47 +0000

The 7 best non essential items for a Costa Rican Trip:

Coozie- As Costa Rica is a very warm country and an ice cold beverage looses it’s luster pretty quick, I suggest a coozie for each member of your family to keep those beach beverages cool.
Soft Sided Cooler- This was a life saver for keeping beverages super cold, ice is sometimes difficult to find, but it is essential if purchasing and produce or grocery items that need to be kept cold- especially beer or sodas. PS- Bring a couple trash bags, as these soft sided coolers tend to leak a bit.
Bungy Cords- We wish we would have brought a few bungie cords or paracord to strap down our surfboard to the top of the car. We drove for 2 weeks with the board inside, not making the wife too happy.
Drone- We grabbed a DJI Spark before our trip and are so happy we did. Some of our best shots of the locations we visited were with our drone. If you can upgrade to a Mavic or Mavic Air all the better, and don’t forget extra batteries.
Car Inverter- Our Costa Rican Road Trip was over 3000km and there were many times that having an inverter to power up drone batteries or an ipad would have been helpful. Of course having everything charged before leaving your hotel is the other option.
Telephoto lens- Lastly, I would have a great telephoto lens. Our lens was a bit hazy and not the best option for getting those awesome bird shots, sloths, and monkeys.
Mobile Plan- Before leaving we organized a pay per day plan through ATT Wireless, that allowed us to use a data plan in case of an emergency for $10 a day. It came in handy trying to get out of San Jose the first day as the roads are poorly labeled.

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Episode 8- Marriott Guanacaste to Playa Ostional & Punta Islita

Fluidvibe — Fri, 23 Mar 2018 19:08:25 +0000

Our Costa Rican Road Trip- Episode 8 begins with our final massive buffett at the JW Marriott Guanacaste. We got out of the hotel around 11am and began our drive down highway 160, which is never easy to stay on. We missed the turn going south as the road was not paved and the road from the hotel to Playa Negro was a normal fast moving road. After turning around and getting on track, we immediately found out about the roads in Costa Rica, with a minefield of potholes scattered thouroughly through the road for miles. The scenery was awesome though, green lush hillsides, cows, and the occasional ocean view. For the next hour and a half we troded through the countryside crossing 4 main rivers- two with bridges and 2 without. we began to think this was going to be the worst of the river crossings.

We made a pitstop in Playa Ostional which is a large turtle refuge for nesting. We explored the beach for a little while, noticing the hatched turtle shells all around and the vast expanse of this long and desolate beach. We proceeded on our way to Nosara only 9km away, but taking us another 45 minutes to work through the construction and poorly labeled roads. We had thought we had missed Nosara all together, when we made a turn to the ocean to just check things out. Through a rag tag bunch of hippie hostels and random stores and restaurants we ended up on Playa Guilones. With a little ceviche stand and some other sketchy characters, Doreen stood watch by the car, while I grabbed an hour of some nice waves. The kids played on the beach and watched as the surf school directed their students in the nicely breaking waves.

The sketchy vibe made Doreen anxious and we were soon on our way to Samara. Google maps shows highway 160 going all the way into Samara with a river crossing near the tiny regional airport. After another couple of hours we reached a massive road block, the river was flowing heavily and the little Suzuki SUV was going to be no match for the 2-3 foot depths across a hundred meters of current.

Completely frustrated and at a loss, we backtracked to a turn off that looked to take us inland, following many large construction trucks we ended up at the main gas station in Samara around 5pm. For fear that we would have more detours ahead, we decided reluctantly to head inland to Nicoya a large city that the peninsula is named after to work our way past any impending river crossings. The drive was beautiful although adding another 2 hours to our journey, arriving at Hotel Punta Islita after dark.

We were warmly welcomed to the hotel by the manager and were given a refreshing smoothie while we finalized arrangements for checkin. We were guided to our room, that was a bit musky, but suitable for our needs for the next few days. We snacked on some of our provisions, showered and decided to make it an early night. What would we see the next day? Join us for the next episode!

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